Crom Dubh and Richard III

The Walknot is often shown in stone pictures and carvings near a slain warrior. Since many view it as Odin's brand mark, it would indicate the dead hero belongs to him.

The Valknut on the Stora Hammars I stone, Gotland, Sweden

One such picture is found on the Larbro Picture Stones, particularly the upper half of the Stora Hammar Stone, from Gotland, an island of Sweden. In the picture are found many elements of the Odin cult. A figure holding a spear is pushing the dead person into what at first looks like an oven or a wedge tomb. In the tradition of The Threefold Death, a dead king would be drowned, burned, and pierced with a knife or a spear, a sign of his belonging to Odin.

A seeming tree (or symbol for twig) is bent so that it looks like it could be used as a catapult. A twig was used symbolically in some Viking funerals. As the twig is bent, so grows the tree.

The upper half of the Stora Hammar Stone

The Vi

Wedge Tomb at Glantane

Just above the seemingly dead figure, who seems to be a bit too small for the space he is supposed to fit into, is the Walknot indicating the dead person is a slain battle hero. The figure holding the spear may represent Odin, because the ritual symbols.

Another figure is of a hanged man dangling on a noose thrown over a tree limb, perhaps holding his battle shield. One interpretation of the bent tree limb is that the branch on which the noose is hung is not strong enough to hold the hanged man, so it is propped in the crotch of an upright tree. Two bird motif are shown. The one directly behind the Odin figure might be one of Odin's two ravens whispering information into his ear while its mate may have more news for Odin.

Another interpretation of the picture is that the figures represent a progression. The warrior is hanging on the tree, in keeping with Odin's ordeal on Yggdrasil. The next figure might be the spirit of the slain warrior as he moves to the last scene, where an Odin-type is putting the warrior's body in its final resting place. This burial place is too cramped for the body, but this too may have symbolic meaning such as representing an oven hot with the anger and battle fury of Odin, a folding of the body into a fetal pose as it is returned to the womb of the earth, or as a sacrifice such as bodies found in the peat bogs with throats cut and hands tied.

When the body of the English King Richard III was found in a secret and forgotten grave in 2013, it was said to have been put into a hole that did not have adequate room for the body of the king to recline. Rather, the body was folded in such a way as to fit into a small space. Maybe that was not due to haste, but instead to honor or discredit, depending on the point of view, King Richard in the way of the old religion, as the dead chieftains were first buried in the earth at Viking funerals.

King Richard IIIs body was crammed into a too-small grave.

I murmured I had no shoes until I met a man with no feet, Persian proverb

Crom Dubh or Crum-dubh and all its name variations means black and crooked in Scottish and Irish Gaelic. It was a Celtic god of sinister aspects. This god was thought of as a king and was represented by a standing stone monolith. The color black indicates darkness and evil supernatural activity. Richard III had a deformity of the spine which made him less than perfect and not symmetrical. He was not a hunchback, but one of his shoulders could have been slumped. Followers of the old religions may have have had thoughts about Richard III connected with this sinister pagan god.

"The Irish Crom Dubh is ‘Black Crooked One’ or ‘Black Bowed One’, also called Crom Cruach or Cenn Cruaich (‘the Bowed One of the Mound’) and was a sacrificial god associated with the beginning of August. " http://hedgeconfessions.com/tag/crom-cruach/

A preceding king, William the Conqueror's body did not fit into his coffin either. His body was "stuffed" into the coffin after his legs were sawn off owing to the fact that the coffin was too short and the king was portly.

His coffin should have fit him since he had ordered it made specifically for him after he was a fully grown man:

"William the Conqueror was too big for his coffin. Two soldiers tried to force the body in by compressing it with their feet, but they jumped up and down with such vigour that they broke the king’s back. This caused his stomach to explode" http://www.britain.tv/unbelievable_facts/unbelievable_facts_dead.shtml

The Anglo-Saxon inhabitants of England had been savaged and ravaged by the Normans. On his death bed, William confessed to having caused the death of many thousands of people. They no doubt thought he was to big for his britches.

The Crooked God

A little more background on Cenn Crúaich shows that in Ireland this god was embodied by a stone mound that was set in the middle of twelve standing stones that probably existed before the Celts and represented a king and his holy retainers, thirteen in all, a magic number.

"Killycluggin Stone now in the County Cavan Museum in Ballyjamesduff, is believed to be the idol known as Cenn Crúaich or Crom Crúaich, which could mean “bloody head” but I think means “head of a [stylized] stack of corn / rick of hay”. Hay is saved in County Cavan in exactly this form and size. Crom Crúaich was the harvest-god stone idol destroyed by Saint Patrick in Mag Slécht (the Plain of Slaughter)".

A rick of hay seems like a much less sinister image than some others described here, but hay was raked and gathered at the end of the summer as the ancient harvest festivals were about to be celebrated. These festivals often contained reenactments of traditions so old that most people have no clue about when and where they began.

The Stone is in the townland of Killycluggin, about 3 miles southwest of Ballyconnell. “Kill” in an Irish place name often means “church” (cill), but here probably comes from coill, “woods”. Cloigheann means “head”.

Some have argued that the Killycluggin Stone is phallic (using what yardstick, so to speak, I can’t imagine) and have compared it to the Lia Fáil on the Hill of Tara...".

http://mazgeenlegendary.wordpress.com/2011/01/19/the-killycluggin-stone-county-cavan/

It was a law about Irish kings, crowned at Tara, that no man imperfect in body could be king. Such was the case of Nuada, king of the Tuatha Dé Danann before they arrived in Ireland.

"Since Nuada lost an arm in battle, he was no longer allowed to rule, as Tuatha Dé Danann kings must be physically perfect and ‘unblemished’. He was replaced by the half-Formorian Bres, who was quickly found unfit by rule by the Tuatha Dé people for his tyranny".

http://thecelticjourney.wordpress.com/2013/07/12/nuada-of-the-silver-arm/

In the case of Richard III, whose scoliosis made him imperfect, history implies that he killed his nephews to gain the throne, making him crooked in character as well.

"The supporters of King Henry VI, known as the 'Lancastrians' wore red roses while followers of the King’s cousin, the 'Yorkists,' wore white roses as their badge. This complicated 'War of the Roses' seemed to be over when the Yorkists won and Edward IV became king. Edward died 12 years later leaving his two small sons fatherless. Since the oldest son was only thirteen and technically now King Edward V, the two boys were put in the care of their uncle Richard of Gloucester. He placed them in the Tower of London 'for safety.' They were never seen again! Richard then claimed the throne for himself, but rumors that he had killed the two boys persisted. Twenty years later Sir James Tyrrel confessed that he and two servants had been ordered to kill the boys. The story was confirmed after a further 200 years when two small skeletons were found in the Tower.

Richard III ruled by removing any potential threat by execution or imprisonment. Called “Crook Back” by his enemies he was confronted with a new challenge when one of the Lancastrians living abroad in safety, Henry Tudor, claimed the throne". http://www.famouslives.com/williamtheconque.html

Here is a poem that tells of the slaughter of children to the crooked god. If Richard III did kill his nephews who were children, it links him again to the features of that pagan worship:

"'Dindshenchas: Mag Sléacht

Here used to be

A high idol with many fights,

Which was named the Cromm Cruaich;

It made every tribe to be without peace.

'T was a sad evil!

Brave Gaels used to worship it.

From it they would not without tribute ask

To be satisfied as to their portion of the hard world

He was their god the withered Cromm with many mists,

The people whom he shook over every host,

The everlasting kingdom they shall not have.

To him without glory

They would kill their piteous, wretched offspring

With much wailing and peril,

To pour their blood around Cromm Cruaich.

Milk and Corn

They would ask from him speedily,

In return for one third of their healthy issue,

Great was the horror and scare of him.

To him noble Gaels would prostrate themselves,

From the worship of him with many man-slaughters,

The plain is called "Mag Slecht".

They did evil,

They did beat their palms,

They pounded their bodies,

Wailing to the demon who enslaved them.

Around Cromm Cruaich,

The hosts would prostrate themselves,

Though he put them under deadly disgrace,

Their name clings to the noble plain.

In their ranks (stood),

Four times three stone idols,

To bitterly beguile the hosts,

The figure of the Cromm was made of gold.

Since the rule of Herimon,

The noble man of grace,

There was worshipping of stones,

Until the coming of the good Patrick of Macha.

A sledge hammer he applied to the Cromm,

He applied from crown to sole,

He destroyed without lack of valour,

The feeble idol which was there.

********

There came Tigernmas prince of Tara yonder,

On Halloween with many hosts,

A cause of grief to them was the deed.

Dead were the men of Banba's host without happy strength,

Around Tigernmas, the destructive man of the North,

From the worship of Cromm Cruaich,

It was no luck to them.

For I have learnt,

Except one fourth of the keen Gaels,

Not a man alive lasting the snare!

Escaped without death in his mouth'.

Dr Kuno Meyer's translation of the Dindshenchas of Mag Slecht"

http://www.shee-eire.com/magic&mythology/Myths/Dinnshenchas/MagSlecht/Page1.htm

The Threefold Death

Crom Cruaich (Crom Dubh)& The Dalahann

Riders to The Sea, Biblical Implications

Wordshed